On February 4, journalist Lyubou Lunyova and cameraman Vital Dubik were filming a story about an Afghan war veteran in hospital Nr 5 in Minsk.
Andrey Popchanka, the head of the septic surgery unit, where the crew was working, called the police. According to him, their actions were ‘illegal’. The staff prevented the reporters from leaving the hospital.
“Now we are in the conference room. They refuse to release us, and we are not going to pick a fight with them. We are waiting for a police patrol,” Lunyova told Belsat.eu.
UPD: The police who arrived at the hospital has let the crew go after putting down the passport data of the journalist and the cameraman.
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Belsat TV, which has been broadcasting for over 12 years, has been denied accreditation for its journalists. The Belarusian Foreign Ministry has repeatedly declared that it could not issue any accreditation to Belsat because the journalists working for the TV station … break the law.
Thus, the circle closes: journalists are denied accreditation because they break the law and they break the law, because they work without accreditation that they seek. And it explains the existence of absurdist Article 22.9 of the Administrative Code, which provides punishment for ‘illegal production and distribution of media products’. If you have accreditation, you are allowed be a journalist. If you do not have it – you are outlawed.
